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Last week it became apparent T-Mobile would no longer offer Hewlett-Packard's iPAQ h6315 Pocket PC Phone. Today comes word that the mobile operator is offering subscribers the chance to exchange the smartphone for another wireless handheld.

Introduced last August, the h6315 was HP's first foray into mobile handsets. The h6315 hasn't performed as well in the marketplace as expected, however, due to performance and stability issues and, some industry pundits think, the lack of an integrated keyboard.

PhoneMag reports it has seen an internal T-Mobile memo that confirms the carrier's knowledge of these problems plus the new handset exchange option. Customers must ask about a swap, however, as it appears the operator will not be informing them about the program itself.

Subscribers can choose from Research In Motion's BlackBerry 7100t and BlackBerry 7730, the hip Sidekick II, Nokia's N-Gage QD, and palmOne's Treo 600—T-Mobile doesn't offer the Treo 650 yet—among a couple of other devices.

The memo also asserts the operator and HP plan to come up with a fix for the h6315's problems in the hopes of giving the smartphone a second life. Interestingly, although HP already released a patch to address these bugs in some h6300 models, T-Mobile never made a ROM update available to its own subscribers in the United States.

When the carrier finally releases the h6315 patch (supposedly within the next month), its customers will then be able to exchange their defective model for a new one. Should all go well, T-Mobile may decide to put the h6315 back into circulation.

Even with all this trouble, the T-Mobile document indicates the carrier will continue to support Windows Mobile smartphones and Pocket PC Phones in the future. These devices could include HP's next-generation Pocket PC Phone, the iPAQ hw6500.

According to HP, the hw6500 should ship during the second half of April from an as-of-yet unnamed carrier (T-Mobile perhaps?) for about $600.

Unlike the h6315, the hw6500 incorporates a built-in keyboard and two memory card slots—one for Secure Digital cards and the other for miniSD cards. It also supports Bluetooth wireless, but not Wi-Fi.

The smartphone is high-speed EDGE compatible, however. That means the hw6500 can exchange data at average speeds of 100 kbps to 135 kbps on a compatible network. Other features include a square 240 x 240 pixel resolution display and purportedly a 520 MHz processor.


iPAQ Mobile Messenger

HP also integrates a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver for navigation and location services into the device. Even though it lacks an external antenna, the company asserts the Pocket PC Phone will still get good reception from GPS satellites. Where that isn't possible, the hw6500 turns to cell phone tower triangulation to determine locations.